As the Apple v. Samsung trial continues speeding along at the speed of, well, a first generation iPhone with low battery, we finally had some real developments in court yesterday, breaking up the recent monotony of expert witnesses and attorney v. attorney quibbling.
Apple rested its case, and Samsung managed to score a minor victory by getting a few of its phones dropped from the case. Seeing as there are more than a dozen phones at issue, it’s definitely a minor victory, but it’s better than nothing — especially since Samsung’s Quinn Emmanuel lawyers haven’t exactly been the popular kids in court so far…
So, the Apple v. Samsung trial is on break for one more day, but that doesn’t mean the digital drama is fading. The trial has become ubiquitous in the news. We’ve got a clip from Conan O’Brien mocking opining on the proceedings… or more specifically, Samsung. And we’ve got word that another Quinn Emanuel partner is in the hotseat.
UPDATE (5:09 PM): We have added Quinn Emanuel’s official response to the newest controversy at the end of this post. It’s a doozy.
In the meantime, one news outlet is heralding the case as the trial of the century, while another says the outcome is irrelevant anyway. So let’s take a step back and think about what it all means…
As some of you may have noticed, I spent yesterday in the San Jose Federal Courthouse, watching (and furiously tweeting) the Apple v. Samsung trial. The trial is on recess today, and I’m back in my blogger cagebedroom office. I’ve got a rundown of all the excitement, awkwardness and humiliation that can only happen in a highly publicized celebrity murder, err, patent trial.
Click through to see what’s shaking as the trial progresses….
Last time we checked in at the Apple v. Samsung intellectual property trial, John Quinn was responding to heat from Judge Lucy Koh over allegations that he had authorized a press release with information that had been deemed inadmissible.
The case continued on Friday, and it has started back up again today as well. So, how did Judge Koh react to Quinn’s justification of his decision? And what dirt have the two tech giants continued slinging at each other? Well, let’s see….
It almost feels like John Quinn is the one on trial, instead of Apple and Samsung.
* Last year, the TSA was supposed to hold public hearings about those naked body scanners everyone loves so much, but they still haven’t done it (surprise, surprise). Now the D.C. Circuit is starting to get angry. [Wired / Threat Level]
* Is there really life, hope, and maybe even an associate position beyond doc review work? This writer thinks so. [Greedy Associates]
* Remember the man convicted of murder who claimed that “celebrity angels and demons” told him to do it? His mistress and coworker of has now been arrested and charged as well. [AJC]
* This is a comic strip about a bear who also happens to be a lawyer. It is silly but also surprisingly clever, and funny jokes abound. [Bear Lawyer]
* Apple fired back at John Quinn regarding his declaration in the Apple / Samsung trial, and then the company filed “an emergency motion for sanctions” with Judge Lucy Koh. I think everyone in this case needs to take a timeout and cool their jets for a while. [Bloomberg]
* I mean, the trial is so hostile, the parties can’t even agree on the name of the case. [All Things D]
Man, I really wish I could sit in the gallery at the Apple v. Samsungtrial over the next few weeks. It’s a war zone down in San Jose. In court yesterday, Judge Lucy Koh became “livid” when she found out about a Samsung statement describing evidence that had been ruled inadmissible by the court. She demanded to know John Quinn’s involvement in the statement (Quinn Emanuel represents Samsung), and then she threatened to sanction him. Whoa.
Quinn was ordered to explain himself, and we’ve got the declaration he filed this morning. It’s a doozy, and predictably, the master litigator does not take kindly to, in his words, “media reports… falsely impugning me personally”…
Maybe they should just change the name of Silicon Valley to Valley of the Lawsuits. Tech companies love to sue each other. Today, the media has been abuzz about the start of the long-awaited IPtrial between Apple and Samsung. Apple has accused Samsung (and other companies in other cases) of ripping off its iPhone and iPad designs. Jury selection began this morning in San Jose, and opening statements are expected before the end of the day.
Apple knows it’s good to be king, but the company also knows you’ve got to fight to defend your castle. All the other tech companies won’t let you sit on your throne without a fight…
* What kind of a Dewey pun will be used later today when we discuss this global “clawback” deal for former D&L partners? I dunno, but “Dewey know how f**ked we are?” seems rather appropriate at this point. [Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)]
* Judge Lucy Koh recused herself from a Facebook privacy lawsuit without providing a reason for doing so. Given that a petition to impeach her popped up online, she probably doesn’t want to piss off any other tech companies right now. [Reuters]
* Mississippi: a state where legislators want to protect women from unscrupulous abortion practitioners their own choices about their bodies. A judge has extended a temporary order to allow the state’s only abortion clinic to remain open. [CNN]
* Good news, everyone! Median starting salaries for recent law school graduates are no longer in the six-figure range due to an “erosion in Biglaw jobs.” Still think you’re going to make big bucks? [ABA Journal]
* A San Diego, California fireworks fiasco that lasted all of 15 seconds yielded not only a bunch of fabulously entertaining YouTube videos, but also great lawsuit fodder for environmental groups. [National Law Journal]
* Note to unemployed law school graduates in New Jersey: selling black-market kidneys isn’t a half-bad career choice, because if you get caught, you’ll likely only be sentenced to 30 months in prison. [Bloomberg]
Here at Above the Law, we regularly cover benchslaps: judges laying the smackdown on poorly performing attorneys. But what about when it’s the judge who says, “I’ve made a tiny huge mistake”?
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh made a significant technological blunder in a patent case between two of Silicon Valley’s heaviest hitters. Yet her mistake is almost quaint. It harkens back to an earlier, simpler time –– like, pre-2006. When legal technology was a bit more primitive, and, more specifically, when the legal profession was still learning to master PDF files.
So, what did she do? Let’s just say she couldn’t keep a secret….
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Ed. note: The Asia Chronicles column is authored by Kinney Recruiting. Kinney has made more placements of U.S. associates, counsels and partners in Asia than any other recruiting firm in each of the past six years. You can reach them by email: asia@kinneyrecruiting.com.
Deal flow has clearly picked recently up for most US associates, counsels and partners in Hong Kong/China and Singapore. We are on the phone with a lot of these folks on a daily basis, many of whom we have known for years. Further, the head of our Asia team, Evan Jowers, and Kinney’s founder and president, Robert Kinney, frequently meet in person with leading US partners in Asia to assess their needs and keep on top of the inside scoop at as many firms as possible. The need for legal recruiting help in Asia from experienced recruiters appears to be live and well. In March, Evan and Robert were in Beijing at such meetings, in April, Evan was in Hong Kong, and for half of June Evan will be in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Thus its pretty easy for us to tell when there has been an across-the-market pick up in capital markets and corporate work.
On an average day in Asia when Evan and Robert visit firms, they typically have 5 to 9 meetings a day, mostly with US partners in the market. The reason they have these meetings is not simply because Kinney makes a lot of US attorney placements in Asia and that a particular firm may have openings; instead these are just visits with friends. After years of working together as business partners, the folks at Kinney are actually these peoples’ friends. The firms Kinney work closely with in Asia (which is just about every law firm – call us if you want to know the one firm in the world we will never place anyone with again, ever, and why) look forward to the visits, or at least act like they do. After seven years in the market, many of the client partners are former associate candidates. Also, these US partners see Kinney as a very good source of market information as well, because they know how deep their contacts are in the market and how frequently they are speaking to counterparts at peer firms.
In a land that is right here and in a time that is right now, a technology has arisen so powerful that it can replace basic human document review. Is it time to bow down before our new robot overlords?
First, here’s a little story about me: my life in the legal world began as a paralegal. My first case was a GIANT patent infringement case that was already six years old and had involved as many as five companies, multiple US courts, the ITC and an international standards committee. I knew nothing about any of this.
On my first day, my supervisor (a paralegal with at least eight other cases driving her crazy) sat me down in front of a Concordance database with a 100,000+ patents and patent file histories. “Code these,” she said. I learned that “coding”, for the purposes of this exercise, meant manually typing the inventor’s name, the title of the patent, the assignee, the file date, and other objective data for each document. I worked on that project – and only that project – for at least the first six months of my job. After a week or so, time began to blur.
What I know, in retrospect and with absolutely certainty, is that as time began to blur, so did my judgment. So did my attention to detail. If you could tell me that I did not make at least one mistake a day – one inconsistent spelling, one reversed day and month, one incorrectly spaced title – I frankly would need to see your evidence. I would not believe it. The human mind is trainable but it is not a machine.
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